Everything outside of the gameplay mechanics is below average
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EDGE #278 - Bloodborne
- Thread starter Boy Wander
- Start date
Everything outside of the gameplay mechanics is below average
ThatStupidLion
Member
hey! Feep got a 5! congrats
Messofanego
Banned
Mirror's Edge getting a 5 is perfectly understandable, and this is coming from a fanboy. I'm not going to flip about in every thread bemoaning some review score as if it was my baby, like many people have been doing here in any thread related to The Order 1886. It had flaws with flow because of the cramped confusing level design for a game about selling parkour to you and ill-designed combat scenarios even if it was doing a lot of cool new things that would become influential over the years.
Here, I found the review to EDGE's review of Mirror's Edge in issue #196, and I'll transcribe:
Mirror's Edge is like a piece of Scandinavian furniture, picked for its perfect blend of form and function, discovered on receipt to have the wrong pieces in the box, ambiguous instructions and too few tools to make it come together. Its showroom lustre is undeniable, and from day one it has seemed a great fit for Swedish studio DICE - the kind of laser-sculpted marvel that years of Battlefield have kept locked in the warehouse. But alas, the package is far from ideal.
Those expecting a style-focused, seductively open parkour game like Rebellion's Free Running are in for the biggest shock: this is more about basic environmental puzzling and rehearsing linear routes. Inspired by movies like The Matrix and District B13, it ups the ante by setting the dogs on you - in this case black helicopters, men with guns and ninjas in hockey masks. To help you on your way, it daubs most of your escape routes in striking red, the idea being to take pipes, walls, jumps and ledges in your stride. Attackers, or 'Blues' in the game's lingo, can be overcome with punches, kicks and button-press disarms - but engagement is discouraged.
Still a great premise, perhaps, elevated by a viewpoint reminiscent of Breakdown, Namco's trapped-in-firstperson beat/shoot/drive/vomit 'em up for Xbox. Heroine Faith, furthermore, is a striking lead - as outwardly hip as the courier bags she collects for Achievements or Trophies. But the game makes a fool of her. It is a Portal-style puzzler or a breathless steeplechase; an Orwellian parable or freeform Olympics? Unable to decide until it's left the springboard, it tries to be all of them but manages none.
Its story is so ethereal you barely know its theme, and when you do you wish it wasn't. Its puzzles scarcely evolve beyond the obvious, its combos beyond sequences its levels can't sustain. Attempts to infuse the recurring, utilitarian environments with something - anything - dynamic produce disastrously signposted boss battles, bumbling arcade sequences and the gross indulgence of Faith's lesser-known talent: turning valves.
But the real tragedy of the game, with its dedicated time-trial modes and leaderboards, is its failure to capture anything of what populated parkour to begin with. There's no freeform or empowerment in constantly failing to make a predefined jump hemmed in with dead ends. Nor is there sustained momentum, nor any real sense of verticality beyond what passes beneath your feet. The game's Unreal Engine 3 implementation is incredible, able to render everything from the rooftops to the street - but it ferries you between them in elevators. The flight-not-fight ethic of its combat, meanwhile, hides an inconvenient truth: it's more enjoyable when taken at your own pace.
Aptly enough, there are two opposite ways to view Mirror's Edge, ours obviously being the less forgiving one. Its ostensible break from the norm, its sparkling monoliths and its Nordic skies perform some kind of counterbalance, but there is simply not enough depth or reward to the realisation of parkour that lies beyond that sheen. [5]
Those expecting a style-focused, seductively open parkour game like Rebellion's Free Running are in for the biggest shock: this is more about basic environmental puzzling and rehearsing linear routes. Inspired by movies like The Matrix and District B13, it ups the ante by setting the dogs on you - in this case black helicopters, men with guns and ninjas in hockey masks. To help you on your way, it daubs most of your escape routes in striking red, the idea being to take pipes, walls, jumps and ledges in your stride. Attackers, or 'Blues' in the game's lingo, can be overcome with punches, kicks and button-press disarms - but engagement is discouraged.
Still a great premise, perhaps, elevated by a viewpoint reminiscent of Breakdown, Namco's trapped-in-firstperson beat/shoot/drive/vomit 'em up for Xbox. Heroine Faith, furthermore, is a striking lead - as outwardly hip as the courier bags she collects for Achievements or Trophies. But the game makes a fool of her. It is a Portal-style puzzler or a breathless steeplechase; an Orwellian parable or freeform Olympics? Unable to decide until it's left the springboard, it tries to be all of them but manages none.
Its story is so ethereal you barely know its theme, and when you do you wish it wasn't. Its puzzles scarcely evolve beyond the obvious, its combos beyond sequences its levels can't sustain. Attempts to infuse the recurring, utilitarian environments with something - anything - dynamic produce disastrously signposted boss battles, bumbling arcade sequences and the gross indulgence of Faith's lesser-known talent: turning valves.
But the real tragedy of the game, with its dedicated time-trial modes and leaderboards, is its failure to capture anything of what populated parkour to begin with. There's no freeform or empowerment in constantly failing to make a predefined jump hemmed in with dead ends. Nor is there sustained momentum, nor any real sense of verticality beyond what passes beneath your feet. The game's Unreal Engine 3 implementation is incredible, able to render everything from the rooftops to the street - but it ferries you between them in elevators. The flight-not-fight ethic of its combat, meanwhile, hides an inconvenient truth: it's more enjoyable when taken at your own pace.
Aptly enough, there are two opposite ways to view Mirror's Edge, ours obviously being the less forgiving one. Its ostensible break from the norm, its sparkling monoliths and its Nordic skies perform some kind of counterbalance, but there is simply not enough depth or reward to the realisation of parkour that lies beyond that sheen. [5]
SatelliteOfLove
Member
Bloodborne AND Alexander O. Smith? Now this is an issue!
nycgamer4ever
Member
An average of 65 with 82 reviews is hardly "almost universally panned". It's at worst polarizing. You people need to lay off the hyperbole. Sure the game is not the best game ever but it was a good first effort that was entertaining with flaws. Made by a company that previously only made games on a handheld. a 4 is 2.5 points below the average, and might I add imo should be reserved for games that are just broken, which the order is certainly not. I wish I could say the say for many games this gen that were released broken and got much better scores.
I'm not defending the game as I think it is probably between 6-7 if I had to score it but it has plenty of potential for a sequel, and if they are allowed to make it I would think they would learn from their mistakes and make a better game.
ProfessorMoran
Member
Shouldn't be much of a surprise, outside of the incredible graphics, the game does have a ton of shortcomings unfortunately, the thing I really worry about is whether the folks at RAD really understand good third-person action gameplay, I don't think they have a good idea of action stealth, and I don't think they have a sense of what would be updated third-person controls, it's like they haven't played anything else since Gears of War 1. Still I feel sad that the game is getting hammered so badly.
My man! So true.
nycgamer4ever
Member
I read this review then and read this now. I rate this review a 4/10. Way too pretentious and obnoxious with some stupid analogies, not to mention comparing to movies that was not once on my mind when I played the game.
For the most part Edge reviews tries way too hard to be "edgy" and it suffers for it. It's clear the writers are of higher quality than most gaming sites but they just can't get out of their own way. I almost always add 1 or 2 points to edge scores to account for my own taste.
Boy Wander
Member
If 4 means just broken, what do 1, 2 and 3 mean? 4 means a little below average when using a 10 point scale. If you read the review, the scores are justified. It's not as if they give it a good review and lump a 4/10 at the end. Read back in the thread and you'll see I've bullet-listed their biggest complaints. You might disagree with them but to say the score is 'wrong' means that their opinion is objectively wrong, which given that it's an opinion, can't really be the case.
timetokill
Banned
nycgamer scale:
6.5 - polarizing
4 - broken
one can only imagine what 3,2,1 represent. I'd imagine 1 is reserved for "directly responsible for the death of a family member"
Wow, what a blowhard.
Account gets approved and the first thing you choose to do with it is throw insults at anyone who likes a game you don't.
You'll last.
Maybe you don't actually have to have read the review to know how bad it is! Would be somehow fitting for this game.
But yeah, discussions about Order reviews have become tiresome to read on all sides at this point. Sick of hearing about it in unrelated threads... though I guess this one isn't totally unrelated... oops.
It's a thread about an issue of EDGE where they reviewed and scored The Order and previewed Bloodborne.
NekoFever
Member
A truly terrible game, not fun, offensive stereotypes for characters, less than an hour long, intrusive DLC, but no technical problems. 6/10.
I rate this post above average. 9/10.
autoduelist
Member
Except there are. A couple outlier outlets that use the 'whole scale' are only farking with metacritic values, which in turn can affect sales and developers.
I totally understand that some review outlets 'use the whole scale'. That doesn't change the fact that when they give a game a 4, it hurts the game just the same as any other 4 since metacritic and most people who see it don't know nor care that they are using the whole scale.
Besides, the order's metacritic makes it pretty clear it got piled upon when it reviewed worse than some of the famed 'broken' games of last gen.
boredandlazy
Member
Although it seems it's rather easy for some people to criticise a game they haven't played.
metalslimer
Member
The next Last Week Tonight's How is this still a Thing? should be about the bitching about The Order review scores
hardcastlemccormick
Banned
I think it was an excellent review. It was specific and articulate. Comparing a game to movies I never considered once is the reason I read reviews - I want to read a thought I hadn't had myself.
Pretentious is such a terrible word. I give it a 4/10. It's utterly broken and used in the worst ways. Edge would probably give the word a 1/10, but I know better than them.
This only proves that that Metacritic is flawed, not the outlets using the scale for whatever they want.
People could see a game they like inside of a broken experience. There's plenty of justification for various scores. My favorite one: scores are arbitrary, made-up simplifications of opinions.
Messofanego
Banned
This has been said many times but the onus on the repercussions from Metacritic do not fall on the critics but publishers if that affects their relationship with developers in negative ways. That 85 developer bonus crap has to go. Plus, Metacritic blows.
Boy Wander
Member
It is out. And the reviewer raises points. I haven't played the game so can't say whether they are good. They seem valid based on what other reviewers have said.
Woo-Fu
Banned
By tomorrow it will take longer to read this thread than it will to play through all of The Order.
Surely the logical conclusion to this is "Therefore, Metacritic's algorithm is inadequate"
I never really got into Edge, but the Feb issue had a feature about arcade gaming collectors, written by a friend and featuring interviews with 2 friends of mine so I'll have to check the mag out some more... The Alexander O Smith article sounds pretty interesting in particular.
No.
Aces&Eights
Member
I believe any Souls lover out there couldn't give a rat's ass what score Bloodborne ends up getting by the critics. This game is looking to be the epitome of what Miyazaki has envisioned for his franchise and I think it is going to be one of the greatest games ever created.
The wait is so painful.
The wait is so painful.
kojirosasaki
Banned
Edge is not needed, has the biggest ego that Big Ben of London.
For me give 4 to play as the order only has two reasons. The first trolling. The second have no idea videogames.
A game that has a 10 in graphics,10 of sound an equal solid gameplay that other shooters can not have a 4. It is a bad joke.
For me it has a 4 story and 5 gameplay. Damn you, opinions!! Especially those boiled down to a numerical score!
The gameplay is worse than the almost 10 year old game that it apes. The cutscenes are intrusive and boring. The amount of gameplay in it it terrible value for money. Luckily I only lost £2 on it after I sold it.
thunder_snail
Member
The Order does have 10 in both sound and graphics. It also has solid gun play but it's just not used right. It's wrong to make The Order as a scapegoat to point out what's so wrong with these type of games but it has to be done for the sake of future games imo.
Problem is that the average game gets 7/10 nowadays, not 5/10 as it should.
I also thought they said the score was coming today.
Edit: Oh. Damn.
The other problem is that reviewers only use the whole scale on The Order. I don't really disagree with the low scores, but pretending they're consistent is silly.
"Pretentious" is not a synonym for "well-written".
kojirosasaki
Banned
Make it boring for you does not mean it is for others. Matter of taste.
¿For the sake of future games imo? LoL
Yes, it is much better draw 3 clonic games like COD that innovate greatly. Then we complain that the studies do not dare to do anything different. Hopefully some learn to differentiate own tastes with real game problems.
airmangataosenai
Member
This game specifically sounds pretty shitty going by the RLM review, but yeah I do feel like this is a factor for some games.
Dark_castle
Junior Member
Or maybe they just don't like it. Just saying.
I feel sorry for you that you're so easily swayed by other people's opinions. You should probably experience something yourself before calling something 'completely shit'.
Mr. Poolman
Member
Learn this kid.
Gameplay > Graphics
Always.
Good gameplay can make an ugly game play good.
Bad gameplay can make a beautiful game bad.
The Order evidently focuses on just one of them, and by Edge's score is evident they think on my line of tought.
It shows failure at several levels. The writer in the first place, the writer's proofreading, and the review editor's quality control.
It doesn't invalidate the review, but it's also not acceptable to publish at that standard.
kojirosasaki
Banned
Learn this kid.
The sum of the sections of a game make this a good game. The gameplay of the game is just as solid as in other shooters. That you not like the proposal it has also many cinematics, does not make the action parts of the game that this is bad.. You've learned something new.
Auto-Reply
Member
Is this the Angry Joe The Order Review thread?
YEah that's exactly what I mean. The Order's scores would make sense if most games didn't get such inflated scores.